Paes-Bhupathi in round two

The Indian duo of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi moved into the second round of the Australian Open on Thursday.

The pair, seeded third at the open, defeated the unseeded team of Julian Knowle of Austria and Michael Kohlmann of Germany 6-2, 5-7, 7-5 in the first round.

They now will face the French pair of Michael Llodra and Fabrice Santoro on Friday.

The match took 119 minutes and was closely fought.

The Indians raced away with the first set in just 24 minutes, breaking their opponent's serve twice.

But they faltered in the second set as Knowle/Kohlmann broke them twice to level back.

In the third set, the Indian got the vital break in the 11th game, when they broke Knowle's service game to go up 6-5. Bhupathi served-off the next game to take the match.

There were no upsets in the doubles, as all the seeds moved into the second round.

Meanwhile, in the mixed doubles, Bhupathi will play with his regular partner Elenea Likhovtseva of Russia and the duo are seeded second, while Leander Paes will play with Miriam Oremans of the Netherlands.

Bhupathi/Likhovtseva are placed in the lower half of the draw and will face the American pair of Brian MacPhie and Lori McNeil in the first round.

Paes/Oremans are placed in the upper half of the draw and will take on the fifth seeded pair of Donald Johnson of the United States and Els Callens of Belgium in the first round.

Paes's regular partner Lisa Raymond is playing with Mike Bryan of the US and are seeded sixth. The Australian pair of Todd Woodbridge and Rennae Stubbs is the top seed, while Jared Palmer of the US and Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario of Spain are seeded third.

Earlier report:
Paes-Bhupathi seeded third for Australian Open